


Mercy

by psycho_phreak



Category: Saints Row
Genre: Gen, can be read bossgat or boss/kinzie if you want, no particular ships because my boss is a slut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-04
Updated: 2018-09-04
Packaged: 2019-07-06 16:35:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15889881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/psycho_phreak/pseuds/psycho_phreak
Summary: If the Boss is saying please then something is very very wrong





	Mercy

The Boss was prone to blaming herself for everything and anything. One of the pitfalls of thinking you’re invincible and in charge of the world. So when the earth blew up, Kinzie should have anticipated the Episode that followed.

The Boss spent her days in the Simulation, just coming out to eat and sleep. She barely said anything to Kinzie and Keith unless they asked her a direct question. It came as a bit of a shock when the Boss approached Kinzie in the cargo hold.

“Hey Kinzie, wanna fuck?” she asked. 

Kinzie scoffed and didn’t deign to look up from the computer. The Boss knew what she wanted from sex and the two had come to an understanding that the Boss could not provide that.

So this was unexpected. But the Boss was still standing there. Kinzie glanced at her.

“Please,” she said, her voice cracking slightly.

And this really surprised Kinzie. Aliens she could take. The earth exploding was devastating, but not totally outside of her predictions. 

But this was completely unforeseeable.

She considered for a second. The Boss looked like hell – time spent in the Simulation did not count as sleep, so the few hours of real sleep she was getting was not obviously not enough. She had obviously not washed in a while. The weeks in space had done her no favours and her bones were starting to protrude where they had not before.  
Kinzie thought about the Simulation. She hadn’t spent long in it but she knew how feeling in there worked, how pain transmitted itself with electricity and a dull vibration in your head. Everything was detached.

Kinzie had been staring at the Boss for just a stupid amount of time now. It was surprising that the Boss had let her.

Without warning she punched the Boss square in the face. Before she could recover, Kinzie was leaping onto her. 

If the Boss was looking for sensation, that’s something that Kinzie could supply in abundance.

***

Pierce just Could Not Stand the Simulation. He hated how it was night all the time, he hated the big red hulking spaceship tower, and he hated how he couldn't feel a fucking thing.

Most of all he hated the zin.

But now, staring at a sign with letters the height of a man, he found a whole new thing to hate.

“The price of pride is 7 billion people dead.”

“Your home is GONE.”

“We will never stop.”

“Hey Boss,” he said, jogging over to a crater in the ground that used to be a zin. “Have those signs always been there?”

“I’m kinda busy Pierce!” she yelled. She did look kinda busy. Portals were randomly appearing everywhere and now robots that looked like lasery snowmen were appearing.

Pierce sighed and went to help.

When the smoke had cleared and the robots were no bots, Pierce tried again.

“Those signs I was talking about,” he said. “Have they always been there?”

“What? Oh. Yes.” 

“Kinda fucked up isn’t it?”

The Boss sighed. “Yes it is.”

“Zinyak’s really playing off your insecurities like that.”

“Pierce. Shut the fuck up.”

There was silence for a minute.

“I’m just saying he seems to really know what goes on in your head-”

The Boss grabbed his collar and pulled him down to her and suddenly Pierce was terrified. She only touched him if he had gone too far, which now he apparently had.

“Pierce stop talking about this,” she ground out. She pushed him away and he saw how stiff and uncomfortable she was when she spat out “Please.”

He watched her stalk away. Then hurriedly signed out of the Simulation so that she couldn’t do anything unsavoury to his physical body.

Well, not without him struggling anyway.

***

Johnny Gat was back.

The first night was glorious. Pierce had figured out a way to synthesise the alien food into alcohol and they got fucked up on weird alien shit and nostalgia trips. Johnny hadn’t met half the new crew, so going around sharing old war stories was a good way for him to introduce himself, and to reminisce with the old Saints.

He couldn’t get over how old the Boss looked. He wondered if this was what it was like for her coming out of the coma. You wake up one day and everyone’s older.

She was quieter too, and he couldn’t tell if that was how she was now or if it was just the night that was in it. He coaxed her into talking often enough. Whenever he caught her staring at him like she was about to wake up.

“Do you remember when we-”

“That wasn’t you that was me-”

“Shit, I couldn’t wait to kill that guy-”

They fell asleep telling stories and when Johnny woke up the Boss was back in the Simulation.

She didn’t come out for three days.

According the that hacker girl – Kirsty? No, Kinzie – this was routine. It was explained to him that the Boss would go into the Simulation and stay in there until she physically couldn’t. She would come out and eat whatever she could get her hands on before collapsing and sleeping where she fell.

She called him in sometimes, for murderin’, for missions, for something called Genkibowl, but in the Simulation she was single minded and outside of it she was half dead with exhaustion.

He grabbed her on her way back into Fake Steelport one day, after she spent six hours recovering from a two day stint.

“Let’s play cards,” he said.

She grinned at him and shook his hand off. “I’d love to but there’s just so much I have to do in the Simulation today. How about when I get back?”

“You won’t get back for days and you come back you’ll just pass out on me again,” he said. Caught the accusation in his voice too late. Saw the hesitation in her eyes. “C’mon, we’ve barely talked since I got back.”

“Okay,” she relented. “Just one game. And you can’t cheat!”

They chased Pierce out of the rec room and set up shop. They managed to go three rounds without incident when Johnny felt safe enough to start asking questions.

“So what’s up with you lately?” 

“Whaddaya mean?”

He shrugged and hid behind his cards. “You’ve been in that fucking machine non-stop.”

She grinned and said “If you want a fucking machine I think CID can-”

“Stop it,” he said and was surprised when she did. “I’m serious. You’re killing yourself in that Simulation. Pretty surprised nobody held you down and made you take a nap already.”

The Boss snorted and was quiet for a moment. “They look at me the same way they used to look at you,” she eventually said. “Like they think I’m unstoppable. Like I can do anything.” She grinned up at him but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. “I just… I don’t wanna let the crew down, y’know?”

Johnny hmm’d and cleared his throat. 

“I was never um. I was never unstoppable.”

She laughed. “I fuckin knew that Johnny. I watched you get hurt enough.”

She carefully studied her cards, the same way Johnny hid behind his.

“I’m watching you hurt right now,” he said, soft enough that he wasn’t sure she heard.

“The Simulation doesn’t hurt me.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

He was watching her carefully now, the same way he had watched her after Carlos, the way she had watched him after Aisha.

“Johnny please,” she said, a crack in her voice where there wasn’t before. “Just let me do this.”

She threw down her cards and stalked off.

Johnny stayed sitting until Pierce came prowling around looking for his couch back.

***

A giant robot was just not fair.

If the Boss had known that Zinyak had his own personal giant robot on call, she would have at least brought hers along too. But to be fair, her giant robot would not have helped  
with the suicide CIDs. SuiCIDs? Whatever.

They weren’t fair either. And the giant shield? That was the least fair.

All she wanted was a nice regular match so she could beat the shit out of the giant alien. A one on one, flesh on flesh match. Something she could at least die with honour over.

Now there was so much red tape and bullshit that she felt like President again.

She flung the last CID in and took a moment to breathe.

And then those bullshit portals were everywhere.

She leapt back into action but now Zinyak was calling reinforcements. This here, this whole army was now the most least fair thing.

She was sick of it.

“I’m getting’ a lil worried here guys,” she said. “Kinzie? CID? Keith? Anyone?”

She hoped the wouldn’t make her beg; she hoped the gods she didn’t believe in wouldn't force her to her knees.

Then those fucking murderbots were shooting at her again and the zin soldiers were getting in her fucking way and then-

“Sorry we’re late!” Kinzie yelled across the room. Were their comms down?

“Time to get this shit started,” from Pierce, and the acoustics were fucking fantastic in there.

“What is this intrusion?” Zinyak complained, and she could not wait to rip his head off his body.

“Don’t worry, we got your back!” Gat’s voice rose above the noise. “Get the fuck away from the Boss, assholes!” 

She could kiss him.

Asha was yelling and Pierce was shouting and the zin in front of her was screaming but she could barely hear it. 

For the first time since the earth was destroyed she felt at home. In the middle of a battle, surrounded by her friends, supported by her crew. She hadn’t felt so whole in years.

The Boss carried that feeling of love over to the central platform and lovingly smashed Zinyak’s face in. She had a sense of nostalgiac bliss as she suplexed him and stomped on his head. She felt like she was just dragging out the battle when she settled at his neck and got down to the task of ripping his head off.

Sitting on the throne didn’t feel like coming home.

But it did feel like a new beginning.

**Author's Note:**

> Right so this used to be a 5 + 1 thing but 2 of my 5 just weren't very good so I've taken them out and now this is just a story


End file.
